#704) Bamboozled (2000)

The Plot: Writer Pierre Delacroix (Damon Wayans) hates his job at the CNS television network, working for his White boss Thomas Dunwitty (Michael Rapaport) who constantly rejects his scripts with positive depictions of African Americans. Hoping to get fired (he is contractually unable to quit), Pierre, with reluctant assistance from his secretary Sloan Hopkins (Jada Pinkett Smith) and recruited buskers Manray and Womack (Savion Glover and Tommy Davidson), pitches a modern-day minstrel show complete with blackface and the offensive stereotypes of the era. To everyone’s surprise, Dunwitty loves the idea and gives the series the green-light, with “Mantan: The New Millennium Minstrel Show” becoming the biggest hit on television. Although the show is met with protest, notably by a militant Black group led by Sloan’s brother Julius (Mos Def), its runaway success leads a resurgence in blackface, and Pierre gets caught up in the attention and accolades he is receiving for the show. But the satire takes a sharp turn into tragedy in this Spike Lee joint finding a new audience 20 years later.

Why It Matters: The NFR praises Spike Lee’s “unique talents” and his ability to use satire that “reveals the ills of society”.

But Does It Really?: I had to sit with this one for a while. I remember “Bamboozled” coming and going in 2000, but I was totally unaware of its reassessment as a cult favorite that predicted where the culture was going, so imagine my surprise when it showed up on the Registry. As for the film itself, I think Spike Lee was trying to have it both ways: a satiric comedy criticizing the media depictions of African Americans, as well as a more somber cautionary tale of modern-day minstrelsy, and I don’t think he fully succeeds at either. Granted, the movie is at times very funny and very distressing, and Spike Lee’s commentary on Black media is still depressingly accurate almost 25 years later, but ultimately the film itself could have been sharper, more focused, or at the very least shorter (Comedy is fast, this movie is 136 minutes). Either the NFR induction of “Bamboozled” is too early or, just like Spike Lee with this movie, maybe the NFR knows something the rest of us are just figuring out.

Shout Outs: “Bamboozled” pays appropriate homage to the similar media satires that came before it: “A Face in the Crowd” (the film is dedicated to “Face” writer Budd Schulberg), “The Producers“, “Putney Swope“, and “Network“. The montage at the end features clips from NFR entries “The Birth of a Nation“, “The Jazz Singer“, “Jezebel“, and “Gone with the Wind“. Bonus meta-clip: Denzel Washington in Spike Lee’s “Malcolm X”!

Wow, That’s Dated: A lot of ’90s culture mentioned throughout, including Jerry Springer, the OJ Simpson trial, “Gettin’ Jiggy wit It”, “Kenan & Kel”, “Show me the money!”, and I swear I’m not making this up, the TV show “Homeboys in Outer Space“.

Title Track: The title is said once courtesy of the “Malcolm X” clip (“Ya been took! Ya been hoodwinked! Bamboozled!”). Bamboozled is also the name of one of the antique games Pierre collects.

Seriously, Oscars?: No Oscar love for “Bamboozled”. In fact, outside of several Black Reel nominations and a Freedom of Expression award from the National Board of Review, no awards love at all. Adding insult to injury, this is one of the rare NFR movies to receive a Stinkers Bad Movie Award nomination: Damon Wayans for Worst Actor (losing to John Travolta in “Battlefield Earth”).

• It’s an interesting casting choice to have Damon Wayans, one of our funniest stand-ups/sketch comedians, play the buttoned-up straight man. It makes you appreciate the moments where Pierre is allowed to loosen up (his stunned reactions during the “Mantan” auditions are my favorite). While we’re talking about Wayans’ performance, Pierre’s French-by-way-of-Sidney-Poitier-impression accent is definitely a choice, but you do get used to it after a while. I suspect the accent is what earned Wayans his Stinkers nomination, but I don’t think it’s that bad.
• “Bamboozled” is notable for being filmed primarily with digital camcorders, which gives the film a lesser overall picture quality (I legitimately thought something was wrong with my TV) but did allow Spike Lee to film from more angles during a take and keep the film under budget. It also adds to the film’s authenticity and ridiculousness, almost like a hidden-camera show.
• I know Jada Pinkett Smith primarily through the media attention her personal life has been getting in recent years, so her performance as Sloan is an important reminder that she is a very good actor, doing some wonderfully layered work here. And that is all I wish to say about Jada Pinkett Smith at this particular moment; opting to – and I’m paraphrasing here – keep her name out of my fucking mouth.
• Another meta-reference: Dunwitty defends his use of the n word by saying that he doesn’t “give a god damn what that prick Spike Lee says”. Things get meta again during the pitch meeting with Pierre’s shout-out to “In Living Color”, the sketch comedy show that gave Damon Wayans and Tommy Davidson their start.
• The pitch scene is hilarious, with Dunwitty’s explosive enthusiasm for the project matched by the flawless stunned reactions of Sloan, Manray, and Womack. The writing of the scene is specific enough to make me believe Spike Lee has had a few pitch meetings like this.

• One of the more poignant moments in the film that I appreciated is the scene where Manray and Womack apply the blackface makeup for the first time. The detailed application process is narrated by Sloan, and you can see some wonderful, subtle emoting from Tommy Davidson and Savion Glover as their characters internally struggle with what they are doing. 
• The first “Mantan” taping is uncomfortable, but unlike every other horrible, racist moment in other NFR movies I’ve watched, this one is at least intentionally uncomfortable. Also note the switch from digital camcorder to more pristine 16 mm film, but only for the “Mantan” episodes. And no you’re not seeing things, the “Mantan” house band is being played by future “Tonight Show” house band the Roots. I was not expecting to see Ahmir “?uestlove” Thompson in this.
• Another moment I found interesting was the standing ovation at the end of the first “Mantan” taping. You can see a few audience members start to stand and clap after looking around and seeing everyone else doing it. It made me more aware of the kind of racism that spawns not just from your own inner hatred, but also from external peer pressure. I know I’ve been tough on Spike Lee in this post, but he gave me that profound moment and I am grateful.
• I love movies like this and “Network” where performers on broadcast TV can say anything they want without getting censored. Apparently “Bamboozled” takes place in a universe without an FCC.
• Making their NFR debut: Reverend Al Sharpton and attorney Johnnie Cochran as themselves leading the “Mantan” protest groups. Another cameo that made me chuckle is a very game Matthew Modine presenting Pierre with an award and being mistaken for Matt Dillon. Weirdly, this is Modine’s only NFR appearance. Where’s “Full Metal Jacket”?
• As the “Mantan” juggernaut continues, more and more people within the film start wearing blackface, to the point where the whole studio audience is wearing it. It makes these kinds of racial representations akin to a fast-spreading disease or something like Nazism; despite the obvious warning signs, you aren’t fully aware of its danger until it’s too late.
• The film ends with a long, long montage of seemingly every racist Black depiction in Hollywood history; from such White stars as Al Jolson and Judy Garland in blackface to the subservient characters played by the likes of Black actors Butterfly McQueen, Hattie McDaniel, and Lincoln Perry aka “Stepin Fetchit”. It goes on for a very long time, but I think the point is to sit with that discomfort and be surrounded by these unavoidable stereotypes. Spike once called this montage “some of the most powerful filmmaking I’ve ever done” and is always quick to shoutout Judy Aley for her work researching and curating these images. The film’s end credits are played over footage of Pierre’s racist memorabilia collection, another sign of our commodification, objectifying, and normalizing of these stereotypes. 

• The reevaluation of “Bamboozled” began around 2015 with the publication of Ashley Clark’s “Facing Blackness: Media and Minstrelsy in Spike Lee’s Bamboozled“, in which he argues that “Bamboozled” is “the central work in Lee’s canon”. A Criterion release in 2020 for the film’s 20^th anniversary has also helped enhance the film’s reputation.
• In the last decade, the prescient nature of “Bamboozled” has become more obvious with the fueled racism of the Trump administration, as well as Black activists fighting to steer the media narrative of African Americans away from these enduring stereotypes. Whether or not “Bamboozled” continues to be a misunderstood cult classic is anyone’s guess, but its recent NFR induction is certainly a point in the movie’s favor.

Further Reading/Viewing: The year after “Bamboozled” was released, Percival Everett published his novel “Erasure”, a similarly scathing takedown of African American media depictions, this time in the world of literature. Over 20 years later, writer Cord Jefferson adapted “Erasure” into the film “American Fiction”, winning an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for his efforts.